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Pat Hogan, right, is a candidate for Syracuse mayor in a September 10 Democratic primary. He is shown during a press conference with Crystal Collette, a community leader working in LGBT and womens' rights issues, left, at his campaign headquarters.
(By Michelle Gabel | mgabel@syracuse.com)

Syracuse, NY - City Councilor Pat Hogan is using the phrase "Ourselves alone" in his campaign for Syracuse mayor.

To him, it's an old family phrase that refers to a community coming together to solve its own problems.

It is also an English translation of the words "Sinn Fein," the name of the political arm of the Irish Republican Army.

Syracuse.com readers have noticed the translation as they see it printed on Hogan's campaign signs and moving through the city on a mobile billboard truck.

Kyle Madden, spokesman for Syracuse Mayor Stephanie Miner, also said he is getting a lot of questions about the phrase used by the other camp.

"It seems odd that a candidate for mayor of Syracuse, NY would be channeling Sinn Fein and the IRA and their slogan," Madden said. "It just seems a little awkward. I don't know what he's trying to get across, but there's certainly members of the public asking us. It has got some negative connotations to it."

"They mean that we can go and achieve our own freedom, we don't need the help of anyone else (to) do it, but that we have to be a free-standing nation among the nations of the world, and therefore the only answer is Irish unity," the website says.

An article in the Sinn Fein newspaper An Phoblact News says the term was in general use in the 19th century before it became associated with the political party. It was a battle cry of Irish armies in the 17th and 18th centuries. A poet in 1840 wrote, ``Our hope and strength/We find at last/Is in Ourselves alone.''

It became the name of the political party in 1905, according to the An Phoblact story.
Sinn Fein is the political wing of the IRA. It represented Roman Catholics who wanted to achieve a united Ireland by reuniting the six counties of Northern Ireland with the 26 counties that make up the Irish Republic.

On the other side were the Unionist population in Northern Ireland, who identify themselves as British and wanted to maintain Northern Ireland's union with the rest of the United Kingdom.

The two sides formed a coalition government in 2007 - but only after decades of violence.

Former U.S. Rep. Jim Walsh (left); Patrick Daniel Ahern, of Syracuse, (center); and Gerry Adams, president of Sinn Fein wave to the crowd during the St. Patrick's Day Parade in Syracuse in 2004.By John Berry | The Post-Standard

"I don't know if people will understand it," he said. "Normally, in politics, you want to have something that people can look at and say, 'Yeah.' But this one would require some explanation, I think."

Patrick Ahern, who is active in Syracuse's Irish-American community, was present in Ireland when the Catholic and Protestant forces came together to form a new government in 2007.

Ahern said "ourselves alone" is a loose translation of Sinn Fein, but it could also be translated as "we ourselves."

"It's semantics, how you want to say it or use it," he said.

Ahern said Sinn Fein is a phrase the Irish came up with when it was forbidden to even talk about an independent Ireland.

"Sinn Fein was that movement that had to be secret and went about framing our country, our Ireland," he said.

He said it is just a common Irish expression used as easily as something like "slainte," or cheers, over drinks.

"Pat's an Irishman and he's from Tipp Hill and he's well known in the Irish community and I wouldn't take any offense to it at all," Ahern said. "I think more power to him, whatever he can use. It's just an Irish expression and I think it's very appropriate."

People of Irish descent have been politically active and powerful in Syracuse for decades. Four of the last six Syracuse mayors, going back five decades, are of Irish descent. Three of them resided in the same Tipp Hill neighborhood as Hogan.

Aside from its Gaelic translation, people have also been asking what it means for a campaign for public office to be framed around the slogan "Ourselves Alone."

Hogan wrote on his Facebook page that many people have asked about the definition. Instead of waiting for solutions to come from somewhere else, he said, Syracuse's collective soul can do it themselves.

"Ideas and concerns will be valued and we will share in the success together," he said. "Alone is a lonely word by nature, but the two words combined describes a community whose strength lies within. If harnessed with care and respect, it will overcome any obstacle in its path."